Nguyen Thi Quyet Tam, Chairwoman of the Ho Chi Minh City People’s Council, has underscored the need to employ synchronous solutions in environmental protection in the locality. 

She made the remarks at the fourth meeting on protecting the environment at urban and residential areas, and managing waste in the city on June 11. 

Tam said it is necessary to intensify the communications work in order to raise public awareness of environmental protection, explaining that environmental pollution in the city is caused by uncontrolled waste discharge as well as bottlenecks in waste collection, transportation and treatment. 

Her opinions were echoed by other participating officials who proposed intensifying punishments against polluters and using treated waste water to water plants and clean streets as well as industrial machines and equipment.

More heed should be paid to the use of plastic bags which are the main source of environmental pollution, they added. 

Le Van Khoa, Vice Chairman of the municipal People’s Committee, said HCM City aims to categorise half of the waste by 2020 and devise policies encouraging the public to join the work. 

Nguyen Toan Thang, Director of the municipal Department of Natural Resources and Environment, said that Vietnam Solid Waste Treatment Co., Ltd, the owner of the Da Phuoc landfill in Binh Chanh district, was fined 1.5 billion VND (66,000 USD) for causing environmental pollution.

The company was also asked to use modern waste treatment technologies by 2020, he added. 

The municipal Department of Natural Resources and Environmental reported that HCM City discharged more than 8,300 tonnes of solid waste and 1.7 million cubic metre of waste water each day. 

The city has tested the quality of surface water of the Sai Gon-Dong Nai River and inner canals as well as air quality of several areas. The testing results have been announced on public electric traffic boards as well as websites of relevant State agencies.

VNA